The Story is About   +  young adult

Immortal by Gillian Shields

Immortal by Gillian Shields

Release Date: August 4, 2009
Publisher: Harper Teen
Age Group: Young Adult
Pages: 368
From: publisher
Interest: plot

Wyldcliffe Abbey School for Young Ladies, housed in a Gothic mansion on the bleak northern moors, is elite, expensive, and unwelcoming. When Evie Johnson is torn away from her home by the sea to become the newest scholarship student, she is more isolated than she could have dreamed. Strict teachers, snobbish students, and the oppressive atmosphere of Wyldcliffe leave Evie drowning in loneliness.

Evie's only lifeline is Sebastian, a rebellious, mocking, dangerously attractive young man she meets by chance. As Evie's feelings for Sebastian grow with each secret meeting, she starts to fear that he is hiding something about his past. And she is haunted by glimpses of a strange, ghostly girl—a girl who is so eerily like Evie, she could be a sister. Evie is slowly drawn into a tangled web of past and present that she cannot control. And as the extraordinary, elemental forces of Wyldcliffe rise up like the mighty sea, Evie is faced with an astounding truth about Sebastian, and her own incredible fate.
With a tag line like “First love never dies...” I was ready for a paranormal romance of sorts. However, it was far from what I got. This novel just had to much going on... was it a love story, wait no, it's a mystery, wait no, it's a fantasy. Not that you can't have interweaving elements present in a story, but this just wasn't working for me. Perhaps if the elements would have been explored instead of rushed through, it would have been better. The romance was a bit of a drag, it was so rushed, there was no conviction what so ever.

It's obvious from the very beginning that there is something not quite right about the school, that there is something not quite right about the boy she meets, that there is something not quite right about Evie herself. It took me no time at all to figure out the main plot twists. Usually that doesn't bother me, but usually I have something to distract me, like exceptional characters, or notable writing, Immortal has neither.

The last one hundred pages were actually pretty good. Had that been the story, I would have enjoyed this novel. The diary entries by Lady Agnes were my favorite aspect of the whole story, if only the rest of the novel would have shone as brightly.